[OS:N:] gnome question

[wizz <wizz linux be>]

I hope that this one is not out this list its reach (sorry if it is), 
but i was wondering about a few things concerning Gnome and Redhat.

I'm a pretty fresh linuxuser, decided to do the switch half a year ago 
cause i rather take my developmentwork to the same environment as our 
webservers. Haven't used anything else but Redhat, with Gnome in X.

I adore Gnome, and i'm very eager to always have the most up to date 
Gnome gear on my box but since the upgrade to version 2.2 was the first 
major Gnome upgrade i experienced, it raised a couple of questions 
concerning the distro i'm running it on.
How does it come that Redhat is so slow when it comes to offering a 
Gnome update for their 8.0 version? Even Mandrake has their update 
packed and ready, while all this time i'm still trying to do the upgrade 
to 2.2 with Garnome (which in my case is a total nightmare).

I do not have the time to start compiling everything manually, and 
especially for an update of this size i like to play safe by preferably 
doing it with rpm installers.
How does it come that Redhat offers such a splendid updatesystem, but 
lacks in providing upgrades to Gnome? Is it worth the switch to another 
distro?

I welcome all thoughts about this...

Tom